Rock and heavy metal music has soundtracked many a bike edit, and we know a lot of mountain bike riders listen to it to get hyped up to ride – us among them! It turns out it goes the other way, too, with some big names from the harder end of the musical spectrum enjoying a spot of MTB action.
But why? The relationship between bikes and music goes back to 1970s legends such as Bob Weir, of hippy favourites the Grateful Dead. Back in the day, the Californian guitarist used to go mountain biking with his friend, MTB pioneer and Dead ‘Party Krew’ member Gary Fisher. As they rode the trails of Marin County, Bob kept a cassette recorder taped to the handlebar of his Cannondale, in case musical inspiration should come to him.
More recently, Pearl Jam vocalist Eddie Vedder has spoken of going on rides with the late Chris Cornell (Soundgarden, Temple of the Dog, Audioslave), Nine Inch Nails mainman Trent Reznor and his family have a fleet of bikes including both electric and regular MTBs, and Justin Chancellor, bass player with epic prog-metallers TOOL, can often be spotted on his hardtail in-between shows.
Guns N’ Roses bassist Duff McKagan has also been papped in the saddle (but apparently doesn’t go mountain biking on a regular basis), and Dutch symphonic metal star Mark Jansen (Epica, After Forever, MaYaN) has been known to enjoy the odd MTB ride despite being a roadie at heart.
Veering away from rock a bit, the late Keith Flint of The Prodigy was a fan of blinged-out hardtails, and Simon Gallup from goth icons The Cure has also professed to a passion for MTBing. Sadly-missed Beastie Boy MCA (Adam Yauch) reportedly had a stake in legendary New York mountain bike brand Brooklyn Machine Works, which he sold to Pharrell Williams (Pharrell, NERD, The Neptunes). We also have it on good authority that American singer Curtis Stigers (who had a UK top 10 hit with ‘I Wonder Why’ back in the ’90s) is an avid MTBer!
Unidentified flying object
Rock stars don’t get much bigger than former Nirvana drummer and Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl, who was apparently coaxed out for the odd ride (along with other members of the Foos) by his bandmate, the late Taylor Hawkins. The irrepressible sticksman – who sadly passed away in 2021 – grew up in Laguna Beach, California, home to the infamous Laguna Rads MTB crew and an old stomping ground of trials legend Hans Rey, and used to ride to work through the hills.
“I liked climbing and I liked the feeling I was getting – the high, really,” Taylor told Outside TV in 2016. “You’re seeing stars and the lactic acid is just fricking running through your entire body and you feel like you’re gonna puke. That’s good!” For Taylor, mountain biking was a healthy way to replace the buzz of performing. He continued: “There’s been dark times in my life when I’ve just jumped on my bike and been gone for a whole day. It [mountain biking] changed my life.”
Dust ‘n’ (collar)bones
Riding gives these stars a break from their busy lives, providing them with a way to keep fit and get out into nature, while also enjoying some welcome anonymity. Mixing music with bikes can have its downsides, of course. Nineties alt. metal band Helmet had to postpone an album and UK tour after frontman Page Hamilton broke his collarbone mountain biking in Oregon in 2004.
Indie guitar god John Squire, meanwhile, was responsible for ‘Madchester’ legends The Stone Roses missing their 1995 Glastonbury Festival set after he crashed his MTB while on tour in the US – in Marin County, no less – and broke his collarbone and shoulder blade. “I was never allowed to do any extreme sports after that!” he told Q magazine in 2002.
We don’t know if John’s gone back to riding since leaving the band, but back in the day he could be spotted in the Greater Manchester area riding a bling Yeti FRO with Tioga Disc Drive rear wheel and Bullseye cranks. Jesus Jones frontman Mike Edwards (remember ‘Right Here, Right Now’?) was another ’90s UK star who was really into mountain biking, riding, racing and later becoming a skills coach.
Raging with his machine
Of course, the hard-rocking musician best known for his love of bikes has to be Tim Commerford, aka Timmy C, bassist with Rage Against The Machine, Audioslave, Prophets of Rage and new outfit 7d7d. Check out the liner notes of those old RATM CDs in your loft (or is that just us?) and you may spot some bike brands in there. In a 2018 video for Specialized, Tim admitted: “I think I ride bikes maybe more than I play bass, and I sorta thank bikes for enabling me to have a career as long as mine has been.”
We last went riding with Tim way back in MBUK 242, so it’s high time for a catch-up. Speaking from his Californian home, he tells us that he bought his first MTB in 1993 – a Trek 930 hardtail with RockShox Mag 21 fork – and riding quickly became an obsession, particularly after he upgraded to a full-suspension Santa Cruz Heckler. He followed that with a succession of DH bikes – a Santa Cruz Super 8, a couple of Intense M1s, a GT DHi and a Schwinn Straight 8 – which he didn’t just ride downhill.
“This was before enduro bikes, so I used to ride DH bikes everywhere,” the bass player explains. “[For climbs] I’d get over the front end, grab the wheel and pull the bar down, put a dog collar around the fork arch and lower crown, and just haul it all the way down. [This would limit the suspension travel and steepen the head and seat tube angles ~ ed.] I’d climb everything on those things!”
Living in Malibu, Tim soon had some well-known riding buddies. “Hans Rey is a good friend of mine. I met him in, probably, ’95, when I’d been riding for a couple years and I was so into it, I was just geeking out on it. I was in Hawaii riding the trails, a van pulled up with ‘GT’ on the side, Hans got out and I was like, ‘Oh my God!’. We became friends and I got introduced to a lot of cycling legends and got to ride with a lot of cool people.
“I ended up becoming really good friends with Lance Armstrong, as well, and went from getting into MTBing for the joy of just going fast and bombing downhill, to using the bicycle as a way of life, wearing a heart-hate monitor and, like, really connecting. I ride with [BMXer turned dual slalom and 4X star] Brian Lopes a lot, too. Those are the main three pro riders I ride with, but I have other friends who ride, too, like John McEnroe.”
Trails on tour
At one point, Tim was racking up a million feet of climbing per year. He also completed the long-distance Leadville 100, Santa Monica 100 and Santa Barbara 100. “I brought my bike on tour and rode every single day, no matter what,” he recalls. “I’d wake up every morning, flying in on a plane, and already be looking out the window at the terrain. If I had jet lag, I’d just get to the hotel, build up my bike, order a little coffee and then roll!
“There was this place I found in West Palm Beach, in the back of a Kmart parking lot – a swamp area with alligators in it, with this incredible off-camber singletrack with roots and jumps! Then in Hawaii, I rode trails that were like something from Jurassic Park. That’s what I want – to be in some beautiful stuff and then think, ‘Wow, here’s some jumps for a little while’.
“I’ve ridden all over Australia, it’s an amazing place to ride. I’ve ridden in Canada, it’s awesome there. The riding in the States is amazing, and all through Europe is cool. I like the challenge of riding on the road with cars, the pump track in my backyard, I like it all!”
He adds: “The bike is a universal language, man, all over the world. I had a flat tyre in Japan, and the next thing I’m eating at this family’s house, watching this kid play Elvis songs on an acoustic guitar, because I told them I was a musician!”
F*** you, I won’t ride what you tell me!
Interestingly, Tim’s favourite bike isn’t a lightweight marathon-racing machine or a comfortable long-distance rig, but his e-MTB. “I love e-bikes, they’re so sick!” he enthuses. “The minute Specialized had the Turbo Levo, I was in. My neighbour, Marshal Mullen, backflips and all that shit, and his dirt jumps are legendary, but we got the Levo when it came out and now he rides nothing but e-bikes.
“Eventually, regular bikes are going to be a thing of the past, whether people like it or not. I’m telling you, e-bikes make you stronger. If you ride them as hard as you ride a regular bike, you’re going to go way further, turn the cranks for way more revolutions and get way stronger, way quicker. They also make you a better rider. I was always just hammering big gears trying to go up the steepest stuff, and then e-bikes came and, all of a sudden, I was forced to understand spinning.
“I’m so blessed that I get bikes from Specialized. I have great people who’ve hooked me up with parts, too, from ENVE wheels to Shimano brakes. I even have my own seat, from SQlab [the 6OX ERGOWAVE active Ltd Timmy C] – all my bikes have those on them!”
Back on (bomb)track
Tim clearly has a lot of love for the sport. However, he admits: “In the past couple of years, I’ve sort of dropped off. I’ve started working out and pumping iron, and I have a health thing I’m dealing with. I have cancer, and that’s been serious, but that’s not the reason I quit riding. I could ride now and it’d be fine, but I just fell out of love with it somehow.”
That could be about to change, though, because since our interview, Specialized’s Fanie Kok has not only presented Tim with a new Turbo Levo replete with a custom wrap inspired by the Rage Against The Machine hit ‘Killing In The Name Of’, but also coaxed him back onto the trails.
“What an amazing experience riding with Tim!” Fanie enthuses. “He’s so stoked and keen. Every trail he looks at, he’s like, ‘I wonder where that goes…’ and before you know it, you’re on your way! If someone in the group tries a move or feature, Tim’s right there behind them – even if it could mean tumbling down the trail, head over heels! A true testament to stoke overriding fear. He hasn’t just inspired me throughout his musical career – riffs, lyrics and activism – but has now been that same inspiration in ‘my’ world. I guess some people are just wired like that!”
Whether Fanie has helped reignite Tim’s riding spark permanently, we’ll have to see, but the sport is clearly still important to the musician. “Mountain biking has been, like, my religion for the majority of my life,” he says. “I wouldn’t be where I am today if it weren’t for mountain biking. It extended my window of opportunity in so many ways – it made me get into health and fitness, it made me dream about going places, you meet good people, there’s nothing bad about it.”
Heavy metal thunder
Tim may not be entirely feeling it right now, but Jean-Michel Labadie, bassist (what is it with bass players and bikes?!) with the equally ferocious-sounding, arena-headlining metal band Gojira, is ready to take on the mantle of ‘hardest-riding man in rock’! “I love the feeling between fear and adrenaline,” he tells us. “It’s kind of like getting on stage for a concert!”
The Frenchman has been riding since the early 2000s, having previously been more into skateboarding and snowboarding. “I was always drawn to the mountains,” he explains. “A friend of mine, a fellow snowboarder, kept asking me to try his mountain bike and lent me videos like New World Disorder. That’s when I first became passionate about this sport.”
“I was more of a cross-country guy when I started, made a lot of mistakes and fell off a lot when I tried to go downhill too fast,” he continues. “But I really started to progress when I met some other riders from my area. I recently had the opportunity to ride with a few pros, who gave me some great tips, which have changed everything about the way I ride. Now, I don’t fall anymore!”
Jean-Michel’s first bike was a GT Zaskar hardtail with 80mm-travel fork. “I only kept it about six months, then quickly bought a full-suspension one, a Lapierre X-Ride LT. I immediately installed a [dual-crown] Marzocchi Junior T, even though it wasn’t suitable for this bike at all. I had lots of fun with that rig!”
Now, he has a fourth-generation Santa Cruz Nomad and a Niner RIP 9 RDO trail bike, both “really great machines”. He also rides a Moustache Samedi 29 Game e-MTB, and says: “I love this bike – it’s really fun!” All three are fitted with Renthal stems and bars, and magped magnetic pedals, which he descibes as “a great compromise between flat and clipless”.
After living in the French Alps for 15 years, Jean-Michel has many favourite riding spots, including the Beaufortain valley, which he describes as “a magical place to ride” with “still a lot to discover”. “I ride all kinds of trails, and always try to push my limits,” he says. We’d expect nothing less of a member of a band known for pushing the boundaries of technical death metal!
Interviews: Kari Young
Additional reporting: James Costley-White